Don Tennant, 79; Created Tony the Tiger

“That’s my boy,” he always said with justifiable pride as he drove past the cereal maker’s headquarters in Battle Creek, Mich., or walked down the cornflakes aisle of any grocery store on the planet.

The “boy” was Kellogg’s lovable Tony the Tiger, his brainchild of 1952.

“I don’t know that Tony is the best thing I’ve ever done, but it sure gives me a kick to see how well he’s aged,” he said in 1988. “[Seeing] his face on the Frosted Flakes box . . . can make my whole day.”

Don Tennant, the versatile ad man who not only created such sales icons as Tony the Tiger, but also gave the Marlboro Man his memorable name and place in the American lexicon and coined such catchy tunes as the one that goes, “Nothin’ says lovin’ like something from the oven,” has died. He was 79.

Tennant died Saturday at his Los Angeles home. No cause of death was given.

The veteran sales guru seemed to enjoy his creations almost as much as the consumers who heeded his siren call to buy products. And unlike many creative geniuses, Tennant cared little about the lack of credits.

“It doesn’t bother me that the box doesn’t say, ‘Tony the Tiger by Don Tennant,’ ” he once told the Springfield (Mo.) Business Journal. “I don’t care about that. He still helped build my house.”

Throughout his half-century career, Tennant found entertaining ways to sell products and services for such international brands as Kellogg’s, Nestle, Green Giant, Pillsbury, Keebler, Campbell’s Soup, United Airlines, Procter & Gamble and Werther’s Original.

Born in Sterling, Ill., he earned a degree at Knox College in Galesburg, Ill., and then served as a Navy lieutenant during World War II. Moving to Chicago after the war, he began his career writing and producing for network radio programs.

The radio and early television exposure showed Tennant how much he liked finding entertaining ways to capture an audience’s attention. Advertising seemed the logical place to do that.

In 1950, Tennant signed on with juggernaut ad agency Leo Burnett Co. and did a bit of everything. He worked as a copywriter, composer, commercial director, editor, artist, filmmaker and marketing and advertising strategist. He was the agency’s first full-time radio and television writer and producer.

It was Tennant who devised the original media campaign introducing Marlboro cigarettes in 1955. A part of the package was his singable little ditty, “You get a lot to like . . . filter, flavor, flip-top box.”

Tennant wrote the Pillsbury jingle equating baking with love and urged travelers to take to the air with “Fly the friendly skies of United.”

He rose to become chief creative officer for the Burnett agency, supervising its 325-member creative staff and was a member of the five-person operating committee.

Tennant left Burnett after a highly successful 20 years and later started Don Tennant Advertising Co., also based in Chicago.

He is survived by three children, Andy, Tim and Tracy, and six grandchildren.

Plans are pending for a party celebrating his life, which Tennant had requested instead of a formal memorial service.